Roadtrip

A month or so ago, I was browser my twitter feed and notice that Leila from Three Dresses Project was coming to the California. Imagine the sound of someone slamming on their breaks. That was my brain. I need to know everything, so I could see her. Amity from Lolita Patterns was planning a road trip up to visit and then meet up with SF/Bay area sewcialist, which sounded like a great plan to me.

Due to Xmas and other expensive that was not the plan for me, but I was determined to go. I ended up going to SF for a day which started Friday afternoon. A $1 plus $1 service fee ride up to LA, in a very sweet Bolt bus. I had a couple of hours to waste, so I hopped on the metro and checked out Mood. I have never been to the LA Mood before. I will have to say New York Mood is my favorite, the 3rd floor alone makes it my favorite.

I rushed back to Union Station, which is good because there were a lot of Korean stores near by and I am going through an everything Korean phase right now. I grabbed a Cosmo and some food before catching my train. The Cosmo was not the best idea because I was getting very sleepy, very fast and I did not want to fall asleep on the train. I took the train to Santa Barbara and then switched over to an overnight bus. This is the part of the trip that the drink would have been perfect for. But no dice, because as soon as I tweeted about being the only person without someone next to me, a lady got on the bus at the very last-minute. This lady made me nervous most of the trip. I think she was a little crazy.

The bus arrived in Oakland a little before 6am, so I found the nearest plug to charge my phone and I took some cat naps at the bus depot before meeting up with an old friend from Philly for breakfast. After breakfast, I got on a very crowd BART train, sans Santa Clauses (SantaCon weekend?) and caught up with the below lovely ladies.

Of course, we all went fabric shopping and grab some food. It was great meeting people in real life and also being introduced to new people. Such a nice group of ladies. We split off into two groups, Leila and I had to leave SF and Amity was our ride.

So far in my experience with meeting people from our lovely community, everyone clicks really well. I guess it makes sense, because our love for our craft brought us together. But sometimes, you meet people who just brings that to another level. This does not happen often for me. I am pretty reserve when meeting someone for the first time and don’t warm up to people right away. However, Leila… different story entirely.

Perhaps we knew each other in our past lives or maybe we chat enough online that it was just natural (my bet is on past life). You would never have guess this was the first time we met. Leila is adorable and such a sweetheart. Yes, I do have a secret crush on her, don’t tell. And yes, I kept trying to steal her petticoat right off her. I can’t wait for next year, I will put aside extra money on top of Xmas funds, so I can have a proper visit with Leila.

Too cute. Can you tell that sleepy?

After, departing from Leila, I got a message from SW airline, saying my flight was delayed. This was a good and bad thing. Bad, because I didn’t really want to get home late but good because I got to hang out with Amity and her husband. I adore Amity as well, which is obvious. Right? You don’t plan on doing road trips with just anyone. Amity and I went back to the hotel, where I could lay down for a little before we tracked down a food truck (which I heard had amazing food). Eventually I had to leave and head to the airport. Of course when I got halfway to the airport, I get another message about my flight being delayed again. I didn’t leave SF until after 10pm (original flight 7pm) Smh! I was very upset at the airport as they kept pushing back the departure time. I could have been hanging out with Amity and her husband. Grr. But that is okay, I can get to LA for a few bucks now and see Amity more often.

I also got a $100 voucher (more than the price of my flight. Yay for savings!!) from SW so I can visit other blogs. There are a couple of bloggers that I MUST meet.

Have you met sewing bloggers in “real life” before? How was that experience? Do your non-sewing friends think you are weird for meeting people from the internet?

So nice to meet you in person, Trice! Thanks for coming all the way up here to visit. It was great to see everyone in person! I do make it down to SoCal once in a while so I’ll let you know the next time I do!